About 50 people with their dogs and children stood outside of the Shenandoah Valley Juvenile Center Saturday afternoon holding signs protesting the alleged youth immigrant abuse happening within the facility's walls.
Bill Walker, organizer of the rally, and his wife, Jan Walker, greeted members of their church and community members before the rally began. At 11 a.m., Bill Walker addressed the crowd, signaling concerned citizens to raise their voices.
Virginia Peters-Shultz, from Winchester, spoke to a crowd of about 40 people first.
"The reason I’m here and I feel so strongly is I was out of high school before I learned about the Japanese’s internment camps. How could internment camps happen here? Ladies and gentlemen, they’re building internment camps right now. I’m horrified," she said, about reported plans for holding families longterm after they cross the border.
Bill Walker opened the floor to the crowd, asking the concerned group of citizens to speak their minds.
Louella Hill, 37, a mother in Staunton with 6- and 9-year-old children, spoke about her childhood at the Mexican border in Arizona. She recalled how her family would cross the border for better mangoes and avocados in Mexico.
Now it’s a militarized zone.
Hill advised compassion.
"When I moved to Staunton I was wondering where the Latinos were. They are in the restaurants. Cast a friendly eye. They live in fear, and you can give them a thumbs up or a smile and tell them they are not criminals, with your expression," she said.
"A simple expression you can say to them is 'Estoy contigo,' it means 'I am with you.'"
Alison Bell, 48, a Fishersville resident who works at Washington and Lee, read one of the poems written by an immigrant child incarcerated at the Juvenile Center, from the story published by The News Leader.
Protesters' signs addressed the larger issue of identifying the locations of thousands of children separated from their parents over the last few months.
Abbie Edwards, 78, grew up in a Republican household in Cincinnati. She said she doesn’t recognize the current Republican Party. She added that she feels showing up at rallies like this is best she can do.
Paul Nancarrow, rector of Trinity Episcopal Church, also spoke to the crowd.
"There are allegations of cruelty going on in that building. I'm here because cruelty is beneath us. We are better than that," he said.
People in the crowd asked about the results of an internal investigation at the facility. The statement released last night by the Juvenile Center said that "after a through investigation, the Shenandoah Valley Juvenile Center concluded that those allegations lack merit," according to Executive Director Timothy Smith.
More community members addressed the crowd and demanded answers about the alleged youth immigrant abuse in the facility. Rally attendees listened intently and passed a statement around to each other called "A rally against Trump immigration system."
Bill Walker noted in that statement that he's been informed that the Juvenile Center is not housing any child immigrants who've been separated from their parents. The Juvenile Center released its own statement last night.
The purpose of the rally was to call on "local governments who run this facility to inform the Trump administration that it will no longer participate in its immoral system," the statement reads.
"This is a caring community that has benefitted from the vitality of many immigrant groups over hundreds of years...unlike Melania Trump and her thoughtless jacket, we DO care — and care deeply," the statement reads.
The rally ended just after 11:30 a.m., with Walker encouraging people to come to the Sunday rally as well.